Alabama has the second-fewest number of fully vaccinated people in the U.S. mainland and ranks third worst for those who have received at least one dose of a COVID-19 vaccine.
Approximately 29 percent of Alabamians are fully vaccinated against coronavirus, according to vaccination tracking by The New York Times. Only Mississippi fares worse, at 26 percent.
Only Mississippi and Louisiana have fewer residents who have received at least one dose. In Alabama, 36 percent have done so.
In 11 of Alabama’s 67 counties, fewer than 30 percent of people have had at least one dose, according to APR’s vaccination tracing, which uses data from the Alabama Department of Public Health. No Alabama counties have 50 percent or more residents with at least one dose.
In just 13 counties have at least 30 percent of people been fully vaccinated, and no county has more than 38 percent, as is in Hale County.
Alabama also had the third-fewest children aged 12 to 17 who have received at least one dose of vaccine, at 5 percent, and the second-fewest of those aged 18 to 64, at 37 percent.
Alabama over the last week averaged 292 new daily cases of COVID-19 and 310 coronavirus hospitalizations, both markedly down from peaks in November and December but still higher than public health experts say they’d like to see.
Dr. Suzanne Judd, an epidemiologist at the University of Alabama at Birmingham, recently told APR that when Alabama can sustain daily case levels of less than 200 cases a day, or 2,400 cases over a 14-day period, and less than 200 COVID-19 hospitalizations a day, “we know that we’re truly close to the end of this pandemic.”
